"We’re doing a snowshoe trip with Denver Parks and Recreation," said Rogers.

Once a week, Rogers and his group head to Summit or Grand County to have some fun. Surrounded by white capped peaks it’s a chance to see the beauty, but also the beast in the Colorado’s mountains.

“Particularly the pine beetle," said Rogers.

Along the snowshoe trail Rogers and his group are on you’ll also see a rash of red, dead lodge pole pine trees all killed by thousands of pine beetle over the past few years.

"It’s a monumental problem and it’s sad to see all the beautiful trees just wiped out," Rogers said.

Pine beetle find mature lodge pole pine trees, then bore into them and lay eggs. During the winter, those eggs feed off the trees and kill them turning Evergreens red. Across Colorado there are now hundreds of thousands of dead pine trees and more on the way.

However, with freezing temperatures rolling into Colorado, Rogers and his friends are hoping some cold weather might kill off the pine beetle.

"Oh, it would be very nice," Rogers said.

From the U.S Forest Service ranger office in Silverthorne, District Manger Rick Newton says cold weather has been known to kill off big groups of pine beetle in the past.

"Historically, cold weather can potentially reduce the population or slow them down. In some cases if it’s cold enough actually kill a sizable population," said Newton.

But it has to get cold. Really cold.

"We generally look at somewhere between 10 days and two weeks of 20 below zero weather," Newton said.

The last time Colorado’s mountains had a snap like that was back in the late 1980s. This year’s snow has also made nice insulation for the insects sleeping deep in the bark of their host trees.

It all means the cold snap hitting Colorado won’t likely affect the pine beetle population unless a colder, longer weather pattern is still out there waiting to cover Colorado later in the winter.